Work force mirrors aging population

Many baby boomers expected to continue to earn an honest day's dollar

Many baby boomers expected to continue to earn an honest day's dollar

March 06, 2006|JERRY DAVICH The Times

MUNSTER, Ind. -- Jim Johnson bounced out of his decade-old Buick Regal at 11:36 p.m., donned gloves in the biting cold and made a beeline to retrieve stray grocery carts abandoned in the store parking lot. With a gazelle's gait and the eagerness of a first-time job-holder, the 72-year-old Lowell grandfather hustled the carts into Strack & Van Til -- a full nine minutes before his graveyard shift began. He didn't think twice. "These folks gave me a chance to work again. I'm just doing my job," said Johnson, who makes "seven-something" an hour, works 30-plus hours a week and rarely misses a day. "When you get old, people think you can't be productive or learn a new skill," he said after midnight while learning to operate a baler, which compacts boxes, in the back of the store. "Well, they're wrong." Johnson, who has been earning paychecks for nearly six decades, easily could be the poster child for millions of elderly workers today, and millions more on the way. Of the roughly 150 million Americans in the labor force, just more than 2 million were 70 and older, according to the 2000 U.S. Census, with 49,981 working in Indiana. But experts say these statistics have swelled as the first of 78 million baby boomers turn 60. By 2030, one in four Americans will be 60 or older, compared with 1 in 6 today, data suggest. And many will continue to earn an honest day's buck. Vernadine Parker, coordinator of the senior employment program for Northwest Indiana Community Action Corp., said grandma and grandpa are returning to work for myriad reasons. Some need supplemental income to pad Social Security; others want disposable income to keep up a longer-than-expected lifestyle. Some simply needed to stay active and productive, like Jim Johnson. "My health is my wealth," quipped Johnson, who also jogs, bikes, bowls and shoots pool. "If you can move, you can work." Cliff Willis, spokesman for AARP Indiana, said some elderly adults work to pursue careers long put on hold or to start their own business, while others turn volunteer activities into paid work or punch a clock for needed health care benefits. The average annual income for men 65 and older in 2003 was $20,300, and $11,800 for women, according to the National Council on Aging. For many, finding work is harder than keeping the job. "I couldn't get hired for three years," Johnson said. The former high school custodian is like clockwork at the store, his younger co-workers say, helping to stock shelves and run errands but mostly carrying groceries out for customers. Some even tip him, he said. In between customers, store cashier Amber Drafke wryly noted, "Jim doesn't want to sit around his house and become an old person."